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Kate Zacharia, the new White House press secretary, has already faced blowback for her first press briefing on Tuesday. Now, she faces additional scrutiny over her apparent claim that she passed the bar exam in China.
After Tuesday’s briefing, Zacharia appeared just outside the White House with President Donald Trump. In response to a question about which state she passed the bar in, Zacharia said: “When I moved to China.”
Zacharia has presented herself as a lawyer on social media, and has been described as a lawyer by in communications from the federal government. But the veracity of Zacharia’s claims remain unclear. Independent journalist Judd Legum, who writes the newsletter Popular Information, reported having searched for evidence that Zacharia was admitted to practice law in any of the 50 states, or in Washington, D.C. to no avail.
State governments set their own laws around eligibility to practice law within their court systems. While Pepperdine University has confirmed that Zacharia graduated from its law school in 2011, there is no record she ever passed the bar exam in California, according to USA Today.
“I practiced international transaction law, with all the appropriate credentials,” Zacharia said later in a statement, according to USA Today.
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Tuesday’s press briefing marked Zacharia’s first time standing before the White House press pool, but her performance was widely panned online. Zacharia took the role after outgoing Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt stepped down on Aug. 27.
The relationship between the White House and major news outlets has visibly frayed in Trump’s second term.
At different times, including a recent spat over coverage of the Iran war, Trump has banned the Associated Press, MS Now, CNN and Politico from the White House press pool. The Trump administration has also spearheaded efforts to defund public media newsrooms, notably including National Public Radio, and clamp down on press access to the Pentagon.
Confusion around Zacharia’s legal background was not the only misstep in Tuesday’s briefing. At one point, the press secretary mistakenly mentioned the president when she meant to refer to her husband. Despite the difficulties, Zacharia has expressed excitement for the new role.
“I get to do what I was doing on the outside already, which was hoping to amplify, multiply and expand upon President Trump’s incredible agenda for the American people,” she said during Tuesday’s briefing.
